Emergency dispatchers are accustomed to dealing with misdials and careless children dialing 911. But a new disruption is appearing across the country and in Rice County, too, that has the potential to waste time and resources for local emergency services.
“It varies between the new Apple Watches and the iPhones,” said Matt Collins, the on-shift supervisor for Rice and Steele 911 Center, which provides emergency dispatching for Rice and Steele counties.
Apple Watches are a popular accessory and tool commonly linked with personal phones. In September, a function was added to the watches that detects falls and/or crashes.
The phones and watches are equipped with an accelerometer, gyroscope, GPS and other instruments to detect changes in speed, acceleration…
